Peace, Love, and Penguins
by Java Trinomial
Summary: Well, not exactly...The misadventures of one crazy-weird chika sprite through the Net.
1. Not Unreally

Chapter One

Authors note:

No, there is no Bob, Dot, etc. in this story. Yes, it could be considered a slight SI. No, it is certainly NOT a Mary Sue. I wrote it and I'm fairly happy at what came out of a day's work. You like it, review. You don't like it, review anyway. Flames will be laughed about, constructive criticism is appreciated, and even just writing "COOL STORY DUDE!!!" is okay. I'm flexible.

Oh: I watched my older brother play the game, so it's loosely based off that. If I messed up anything, well, okay. If it really bugs you, tell me.

****

Peace, Love, and Penguins

Chapter One

__

Not Unreally

I despise starting in the beginning.

Why, you ask? Nothing is interesting in the beginning. All explanation, boring jabber and no real action. 

Middle is fun. Middle you can explain as you go along and still see all the boom-swish-smash action that people like me live for.

So I'll start in the middle.

In System Ceriph.

Where people didn't really like me. 

"Not liking me" isn't the official reason they kicked me out. Normally, it's something like "danger to the system" or such. I just cannot sympathize with them – can't they accept a little fun, for Oosi's sake? Although I don't get how being chased through a shooter game and getting my poor bum melted into radioactive goop could be called fun. But that happened after the fact. I mean, it did happen, and that's a fact, but after the other fact that actually got me kicked out. 

See, since I was thirteen, two and a half years ago (do the math if you want my age), I've been a traveler. Not completely by choice. I'm not saying I don't love the excitement and chaos each new, different day starts withbut once in a while it'd be nice to have a break.

Well, this system wasn't gonna give me one, and I'll deal. 

So, I was in the middle of a group. The group (oh, twenty yelling people) had been quickly organized near the docks so they could find a boat and throw me out of system. It happens a lot, as I mentioned above. 

Oh, I'm not viral, if that's what you're thinking. Completely not. I mean, I'm _polih_, a polymorph, but a sprite, not a virus. Although it could be said that polymorphs have virus-like code, the shapeshifting part anyway, but most polymorphs have a virus master. I don't – I'm _du'Polih_.. So they really had no reason to throw me out for being "viral."

They could throw me out for accidentally turning into a Shivan Dragon and melting the statue of the system C.C with my fire breath, but

Anyway.

So we were all at the docks and a game decided to pop down from the heavens. Just our luck. Oh, don't worry about me, my icon's formatted to reboot in games. But you could worry about me since I and ten others of the screaming mob got stuck in the game with us, and luckily the system guardian as well.

I don't get along with Guardians. They have this annoying habit that makes them have to be the hero. It's a dramatic thing. You know.

So the game itself didn't look too nasty – sandstone walls, large rooms, looked like a fortress. But when there are just rooms with boxes of items and weapons rotating in mid-airyou're pretty badly screwed, 'cause it's a shooter.

Well, I don't know what the shooter was called, but it called for a "capture the flag" scenario. That's what the Guardian told us as we stood waiting for the game to load up. We were a team, Blue as we rebooted, and we had to capture the enemies' flag three times and bring it back to our base.

And oh-we could get killed. But don't worry, he said, if we get killed we'd be automatically regenerated and brought back to life however many times we died. Unless we lost, and then we'd be nullified. And that just sucks.

The guardian told it to us with a reassuring voice, but I saw something in his eyes. I stepped forward and politely whispered:

"You've played this before?"

He looked at me. I didn't look bad – my magenta headscarf had been replaced by shoulder-length magenta hair. But I did look worried. 

"In the Supercomputer."

Figures – this was a decent system, so a game from the Supercomputer could arrive here. I whispered again, "About the regeneration"

"It's called respawning," he muttered, "and it works, yeah, but it hurts like _shit_."

When the game had started, we spread out, leaving one man to guard base. I got a new weapon quickly. It was big, scary-looking, and had razor circles as ammo. I perked up slightly. Cool!

Anxious to test my new device, I shot it once into a wall. The razor spun as it was shot, and on it's rebound (note to self - shoot weapon down a hall next time!!) neatly sliced into my thigh about an inch. I screamed bloody Oosi and ran down the hall, the razor following me. I managed to run right into one of the User's game sprite allies. He shot at me with the beginning gun, I shot razors at him wildly, missing half of my shots. But the razor blades luckily rebounded and sliced him up one.

One KO for Java! Yay!

So, heightened, I turned around, finding myself in front of a guy with a sniper rifle. And oh shit, he's not my tea-

*bang*

I respawned.

And oh gee, the Guardian was right.

In the word(s) of another Game Sprite: PAIN.

I respawned at a random position in a part of the fortress I didn't recognize. Very unhappy as well – I don't like getting killed, you see. So I decided to go find my base and help guard it. The base was only accessible by a long corridor, had a nice skylight, and I figured the offence always has more casualties than the defense. Right?

So off I went to find a nice gun and to find my base. Entered Red territory for a while.

I did find another Ripper (razor gun) but I shied away from it. Instead, I took another nice big gun, with radioactive goop for ammo, and no rebound.

And I found a base.

My luck, I had stumbled apon the enemies base! And with no guards either. I stood around for a few seconds, and then I figured: Oh, heck, I'll get the flag, haul it to my base, and we'll all be happy-dorey, right?

So I grabbed the flag. 

Alarms started screaming at me

Alarms are Bad in shooters.

I started running. _Fast._

I did get the flag back. And then got killed three times in sucession by the User in revenge.

I hate this game already.

I got a new gun, a sniper rifle, and patriotically went to guard my base.

One of my allies nearly killed me with a goop gun of his own, mistaking me for the User. Lucky me, he threw me a healing box.

So we waited.

I hate shooter games. I always get myself in trouble in them. I told this to my teammate and he told me that the User in this system normally played a type of puzzle game which took a long time and multiple times saving, quitting, and reloading to play. The bad thing was, the game was impossible to lose. So you had to pray the User wasn't going to win the time you got in. They rebooted as ghosts, not able to do anything.

We chatted. He seemed to begin to like me. I don't normally get that in systems. Being random turns most people off. He appreciated me!

And then the User came in and slaughtered us both.

After a while, the score ended up tied, us two, User side two. One more win, and we'd either be free or nulls. Yay.

Me and Gill guarded our base ruthlessly after our one mishap. They'd only get our flag over our dead bodies, we decided.

The fact that that already happened twice was starting to depress me, however.

So we sat there, with one electrical-type gun and a missile launcher. Frying most of the User's allies who tried to get at us. Chatting just a bit, over the death cries and gnashing of teeth and such. Amazing what you can get used to over time.

The alarms went off occasionally, but most of the time we saw our teammates respawning from the excellent counterattacks of the User. The Guardian most of all, it seemed. He was getting really down. I made a note to cheer him up if we survived.

Me and Gill had managed to give the User a KO once, when he attacked us, but he seriously wounded both of us and we had to run out to find a healing box.

So we waited.

After a while, we finally heard an alarm, and it didn't stop! Maybe this time we really had the flag! We were overjoyed. Just haul that sucker in here, and no more respawning, no more razors, missiles, goop, frying, or bullets! Yay!

We were so overjoyed that when the User dropped in from above us, slaughtering Gill and nearly killing me, it almost didn't hurt so much. I was impressed by my system's dampening powers.

Wounded, I jumped up and followed the User to get the flag back. In my chase I walked into some healing boxes, lucky me, but I ran out of ammo quickly and had to use the basic gun. And he was a good shot, damn it. All I could hope for was that our team could get the flag to base quicker. I had no chance to stop him.

No, I'm not being dramatic. I really didn't. A User crony got a head shot on me again, and as I respawned, the game ended.

No "User Wins", though. And thank Oosi for that.

I still got kicked out though. But at least Gill waved.

And that's the middle of my story.

My name is Java Trinomial, and welcome to my life.


	2. Dragon's Play

Well __

Chapter Two

"Dragon's Play"

Well! It seems I survived that account (both the actual events and _writing_ it) so I think I'll share another with you. The first biggest danger to life in the systems is games. Butthe second, and only a bit less dangerous to games, is virii. Y'know, that's the plural of virus.

Well, actually some people say viri and some peoples just say virusesbut I think my version is the most chic.

Let me see where I met a virusOh, yes! System Nec. This is gonna be fun.

Middle, again.

System Nec had two things going for it when I arrived. It was beautiful, and it didn't want to throw me out the second I arrived.

Unfortunately, it had about three thousand things going against it. A Virus, three infected sectors (that's half the system) and two thousand, nine hundred and ninety-six infectees. Including sprites.

Now, when I enter a system, the first thing I do is get supplies. Food, water, energy shake mix, that kind of stuff. So in the midst of the fighting, I went off to look for a grocers.

I walked down the main street to be confronted by a long queue. Unusually long. I mean, if I was the virus I'd have sent a buncha troops to capture them all and infect them. But I wasn't the virus, and it seemed to be a decent place to ask where I could restock.

I tapped a 6 on the shoulder. He turned, looked at me, and started. "IT'S A"

He stopped. I waited politely for him to answer the question.

"Your scarf is purple."

"Magenta," I hissed.

"But not brown."

I smiled and shook my head. "Not a tiny speck of it! Why?"

6 exhaled and put a hand on my shoulder. "I though you were a polymorph of Na'ire," he explained, pronouncing It "Na-**eer-**ay." "I mean, he doesn't have one, but maybe he asked someone

"Course not! Well, anyway, Sixie, where would I be able to get food and all? I'm a traveler, and –"

"Right here."

I blinked, looked around. "What?"

6 rolled his eyes and pointed up to the half-blue, half-brown skies. "There's a war going on, stupid girl! The Command.com has ordered rationing. You can only get food from that storehouse," he said, pointing far up the street, "and it barely feeds a family for two days!"

"That'll be six days for me, more than enough. How'sa bout the I/O?

"You drink?" The numeral looked at me incredulously.

"Nah. Use it in tricks." See, I'm a bit of a street performer as well. How I make money. It's too hard to pick pockets, anyway. And that trick is the best!

"_You_ won't get anybut if you give me a days worth of food, I'll ask for a flask for you."

"Deal!"

So we waited.

The queue slowly moved forward, like a morphite-drugged worm. But in the end, and to shorten four hours, me and Sixie got food, bottled water, no energy-shake mix, and a miniscule flask of I/O.

6 screamed again. I turned.

Eight ABC's hovered in front of us.

I guess Na'ire took my idea.

6 clung to me and our food bags all the way into the cell we were thrown into. Unfortunately, I was unconscious for a long period. When I did wake up, I wished I hadn't.

We were trapped in a small, temporary cell. Infected binomes, colored brown and white, patrolled the corridor. And the cell was nicely locked.

Normally this would only be a temporary problem for me. I am, after all, a polymorph. And any decent Shivan Dragon would be able to crash the walls easily. So I closed my eyes, pictured said dragon, and let my form jump into it.

Except it wouldn't jump.

Scared, I put my hand to my breast. No icon.

I let out a long stream of viral invective, which only scared 6 more.

"What?? OhdearUseri'mgonnabeinfectediwannabedead.Why did you scream??"

I hissed and jumped at the steel-like bars. They didn't budge. "Those_ da'Blornik ta'shavi_ took my icon!!"

6 watched me wide-eyes, possibly more frightened on me than of his imminent infection. "So why don't you shapeshift?"

I rolled my eyes. Some people didn't listen in their "Basic Filetypes" class. "Because a poly _can't_ shift without their icon, dipswitch! I gotta get it back."

"ARE YOU INSANE?!" 6 yelled. "WE'RE TRAPPED!"

"You've never been trapped with a poly, have you?" I inquired slyly.

6 shook his head.

"Didn't think so. Let me instruct you in the gentle art of escaping jail cells." I stepped over to the bars again. "First, we must determine the type of lock." I peeked. "Damn. Six place combination alphanumeric lock. Lesse"

"In Basic?"

I opened my backpack. "Password of six places, each place either a letter or number."

"Is that a problem?"

"Well, I did have this" I pulled out a flat button he size of my fist. "It's a password cracker. Does 100 possibilities in a nano.

The number grinned. "Then we're set!"

"There's 2176782339 possibilities" 6's grin faded. "I know. Sucks, dunnit? However, I do have a backup."

"Like what?"

"See, viral binomes are notoriously idiotic." I began to whisper. "I'll lay on the ground and you scream a null drained me. I have a little thing up my sleeve to knock them out when that happens."

6 blinked, then shrugged. I did a little yelp and collapsed.

"NULL! GET OVER HERE, YOU IDIOTS, THE POLY GOT BITTEN BY A NULL!!"

After we were free of that trick, Sixie turned and asked me, "Exactly _how_did you pull an enormous mallet from that little sack of yours?"

I shook my head. "Beats me. It just works."

So it was me, a numeral, vs. an entire three sectors of virals.

sarcasmDamn, I love these odds. /sarcasm

Me and 6 holed up in a small storage room while I tried to figure out where my icon was. "See, it 's probably with the virus right now," I ruminated. "Polys don't normally just jump out for the taking. So we have to find out how to get there. Anything you know about Na'ire?"

6 shrugged. "He's a class three infector, pretty smart, utterly frigid-

*snicker* "And exactly _how_ do you know that?!"

"Intelligence."

I giggled a bit longer. "Is he sadistic?"

"Not particularly."

"Trusting?"

"Not paranoid, but no."

"Any unusual characteristics?"

"Not insanely greedy. Just wants this system." However, the 6 did not seem particularly happy with this tidbit.

"Any unusual phobias?" I hoped.

6 asked, "What??"

"Phobias. Scared to death of something."

Six paused, thensmiled.

We got around the evil virus's lair easily. We hijacked a small tractor, blacked the windows and drove it to the elevator. And from the elevator we were able to directly access Na'ire's throne room.

So the elevator opened, and me and 6 walked through without fear.

Na'ire saw us from his throne and stood. He looked like a statue – wood-like arms, legs, and body, with white stone for fingers and feet and head. Oosi, I thought, if I was made of wood I'd be afraid of fire too.

Na'ire studied me, paying no attention to 6.

"You escaped."

I bowed like a courtier. "My Lord, I am an performer. Of course I have magic in the act. Which is why I had to come up and see you personally. I havea deal."

"A deal? For your icon?" Na'ire was no idiot. "It had better be a great thing you offer. A polymorph could do me no end of good."

I started acting. Closed my eyes and stepped forward once – the guards readied their staffs, but I of course ignored it. I said a few words of mumbo-jumbo and waved my fingers. "His Lordship is afraid, deathly afraidof the golden instrument of chaos, great fire." I opened my eyes. "_Neh?_"

"Anyone in this system could tell you that. Including him." He pointed to 6.

I rolled my eyes. "Okay, maybe, but how many can give you the cure to your fear? Something to immunize yourself forever from fire?"

Skepticism. "Show me. Use it on the Six."

I guess it was a bit too hard to figure he'd be gullible enough. I opened my pack and retrieved a rag and the crystal bottle. I poured the herb-scented fluid into the rag, smeared it on his hand, took out a lighter and sparked it on.

Na'ire flinched. I smiled, then raised 6's trembling hand and waved it through the flame.

Nothing happened. Of course nothing happened. Wave your hand through a candle flame sometime – it's too short a period of exposure to do anything. But no one in this castle had ever done that, so it looked like magic.

The virus was definitely amazed. "You want your icon for this potion, then?"

"Yup! And it lasts for ages, too." I bowed. "May I be allowed to anoint you with it?"

"Yes."

I tsked. "Icon first. I can't trust you."

"I can't trust you not to run away."

"Give it to the Six. Threaten him with death if he messes it up."

6 quailed and moaned, "I thought you were gonna help me!" I rolled my eyes at this. Na'ire noticed, and motioned to a guard. My Icon was in his hands, untouched, and he gave it to 6. 

"In a way, I hope this fails. You're quite ruthless."

You're welcome." I stepped up, moistened the rag with the fluid, and touched it to his forehead, temples, wrists, ankles, and neck. Then, for good measure, I poured a dollop on top of his head.

Na'ire took this in stride, almost with relief. Then he stood up and raised his arms. "Touch the fire to me."

I blanched. "Wha?"

"Do it." His smile was triumphant. "I want to see how it works."

_

Now, I didn't really _plan_ on setting the caelleah on fire. I was just gonna anoint him with this weird-smelling ointment and ditch, and let him burn himself to a crisp. But, if he must see it...

And an wicked idea came into my head.

"II will perform an ancient test to this" I walked back to my bag, casting a longing glance to 6, who clutched my icon like water in the desert. I pulled out the I/O and the lighter, walked back, and took a great bigchug into my mouth.

Then I splashed the bottle at him, lighted my lighter, and breathed fire.

It didn't work as well as I thought. My hand got burnt as well. But the most important thing was that Na'ire was running amok like a cross between a headless binome and an everlasting flame.

In one swift jump I grabbed 6, grabbed my Icon, and did that shift to a large, scary, and overall kick-ass Shivan Dragon. With 6 in on of my claws, I smashed through the floors back to the prison section, smashed the master locking mechanism, and then crashed to the outside and flew into the air, casting a great shadow onto the land. Slowly, I cruised to the ground, surrounded by sprites and binomes, shifted back to myself, and fainted.

When you're a traveler, there's a thing to be said about warm, really comfy beds. They're rare, but a treasure.

I was quite happy when I woke up in one.

I wasn't as happy about the bandaging on my hand and forehead, but the bed was the main thing in my thoughts.

"Hi."

I blinked and squinted up. 6 peered down at me.

"I wasn't serious about the killing you" I murmured.

6 grinned "Hey, it got us out. You're a real nice kid."

I tugged a scarf-end with my good hand, blushing. "I'm a chaotic troublemaker."

"You'll stay until you're recovered. Then" 6 sighed. "They have to throw you out. People are furious a huge dragon landed in their square and broke the statue of the C.C."

Oh well. People are always angry at me.

So I stayed, and then I left. And 6 waved at me.

And here is another middle to end at.

Thanks for reading.


	3. The Quest for the Databush

"Oh, that'un

Chapter Three

__

The Quest for the Databush

Well, for once, I guess I should start nearer to the beginning. Alright?

I know! I'll tell you about the Menagerie! That's my name for my pets. I have two. One I got from my mother, a runt-of-the-litter wotsit called Midi. She's a tiny little thing. Mostly hides in my bag. But the other onewell, she was an adventure to get. I'll tell you the story.

The system was called Dumass. Of course, no one pronounced it right, so it wasn't a very good name. It was warm, and very very big. I kept to the lower levels. By now, I had figured out that most systems had an extreme fear of polymorphs. So it was a survival mechanism. Didn't wanna get thrown out of this one like the previous three.

Don't ask me how I got through customs, though.

The lower levels hosted a bazaar of curiosities. Shops selling pickled datatree roots and blackened netgull cozied up next to antiques vendors with relics of the old days, like a piece of code from a Windows 3.1 OS and DOS commands. And a mallet vendor. I zoomed up to it and bought one right off, with a nice weight and color and good swing. So I stuffed in into my bag straight off, although exactly how I did that I have no idea.

And then I came across a very curious One binome with stacks of cages about her.

Her hair was frizzy and red, and she wore a bedraggled dress. She had a bunch of energy-rich shards in a basket next to her, and the cages were meduim-sized and covered with the same fabric as her dress. She wasn't afraid of me in the slightest. Intriguing.

"What're you selling?"

"What'm I sellin'? Ah, a poly. Ye look like a good'un, one t' be appreciatin' me wares." Her accent was strange. "I'll show ye what I'm sellin'." She pulled the drapes down. "Meet Emsfa, Pix, Dibix, Stfe, Piqe, and the cute 'un."

Nulls.

Six caged nulls. Five of them gave an ear-piercing squeal and slithered to the side of the cage away from me. But one slithered up to me. I watched it, giggly, as it raised its front end up as if to stare at me, then cooed.

"Aye, they do that all th' time. 'Cept that 'un. 

"What do you call this one?"

"Oh, that'un? That's Wave. She's a curious'un. See, the others I sell t' people wi' a taste fer nullcakes. There's quite a few of those kind about here, and no virals either. But that 'un, I can't sell 'er fer that! She's fit to be a pet. She's a runt, don't eat much an' much rather suck yer finger than bite ye. An' she coos. That's why she's special."

"Can I get her??" I was esctatic. Normal people don't get excited to get nulls, butwhen since had I qualified as a normal person?

The One frowned. "Can't just give 'er to any'un. Ye've got t'prove yerself worthy of 'er. Ye'll have t' do somethin' special t' get 'er."

"What?"

"Ye'll have t' get" She paused to think, then grinned. "a databush. Get me a databush, an' ye can 'ave 'er."

"What's a databush?"

"Oh, fer cryin' out loud, ye dun know what a databush is? It looks like the crown of a datatree, an' it's all trimmed an' all. It's pretty."

"And you want one."

"Aye. A nice one," she said. "But not too expensive," she added.

I nodded. "Just one thing. Is there a databush salesman 'round here?

"Aye, in sector 45."

I nodded and ran to find him.

It seems that databush salesmen were not very easy to find.

After I arrived in sector 45, I went to look immediately. 

Howeverwhenever I mentioned the world "databush" people screamed and ran in fear. It wasn't me they yelled at, it was the word. I was stumped.

I went to a lady across the street. "Excuse me, ma'am?" I asked politely.

"Yah?"

"I'm looking for a gardener specializing in dat—_ahem_, miniature datatrees. Would you be able to point him out?"

The old sprite squinted at me. "What's that?" she asked.

I sighed. "A databush."

She shrieked. "No! Never!!" Her hood went over her head, and she tried to hobble away. Incredibly peeved at this, I got hold of her arm.

"I'm not leaving until you tell me where to buy a databush, damnit!"

"Never in my life, " the crone moaned, "I'd never speak of that filthy thing!"

???

"Databushes are filthy?" I asked.

She screamed at the word.

o_O

"LADY!" I shook her. "What's wrong? Are they cursed or something? What?"

"The demon"

"Demon? Pieces of greenery are demons?"

She got enough of her self-control and hissed at me, "The seller, not the wares! Demon!" She tried to tear herself out of my grip. Finally, I pulled a bag of credits out of my pocket. 

"Lady, d'you think these _might_ settle you enough to give me the location of this'demon?'"

Her greedy eyes fixed to the bag.

"Thrid alley off the next street left, you'll find it there" She snatched the bag and hobbled off.

Oy. I was out half my resources to buy the bloody databush, and I was being warned of a demon. For a few moments I paused, trying to think whether I should do this.

Then I put my courage in it's place and went forward.

Third alley.

I gripped my bag frightened. Remember, I had only been on the road a few months, I was barely thirteen, and demons aren't exactly my forte. But I strode on bravely.

Sure, bravely. And Daemon was just trying to be friends when she infected the entire Supercomputer and Guardian Collective.

The alley led me to a shack. Nulls and worse slithered in the shadows. The shack was of thin wooden boards with many cracks. Someone was in there.

My legs felt like slippery energy. I wanted to cut 'n' past outta there.

Instead, I knocked.

Thein there moved to the door. A normal, alto, undeterminable voice answered, "Who's there?"

Runrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrun

"A customer, please?" I whispered, hoping for the best.

There was a noise of surprise. Then the door opened to darkness. "Come in, I'll turn the lights on."

I stepped in. The door closed. The lights went on. I spun around.

A wide-eyed worm stared at me.

You know what a worm is, right? Grow to enormous lengths, travel through systems without infecting anything, but often messing up system's defences. They have no gender, replicating by splitting in two. This one was twelve feet long about, two feet wide, bone-thin weak arms, a dragon-like face. Barely out of childhood. It seemed as frightened of me as I was of it.

It slowly slithered to the back of the hut, keeping the top five feet straight above the floor like a cobra. "I've never seen a polymorph before," it murmured.

"I've never seen a worm before," I returned.

There was a mutual pause as we sized each other up.

"Why do you travel?" it asked.

"I have no master. Why don't you?"

It looked sad, then lifted it's tail. It dangled limply three feet from the end. "You're crippled?" I asked, heartbroken for it. It nodded. "By who?"

"By my sibling. One wanted to be greater, so one smashed the bone and left me to be killed here." I sweatdropped – properly, the pronoun "one" is proper for asexual beings. I had forgotten. "I hid away from the sprites in the upper levels, came here. Built this house with these useless arms." Worms use their tails to great effect, normally. "And make databush arrangements." The worm placed his delicate hands on the table. "What are you looking for, _polih_?"

"A databush?"

"AhhhAnd you were treated to the "Demon" tales, were you not?" I nodded. "I know. They are afraid of me. I steal food every so often, and sully their reputation by my mere existence. Only one person in this system was civil to me."

"One binome, red hair?"

"Yes. The null seller. She makes me nullcakes."

I shook my head. "This was all a trick thenSo will you make me a databush, then?"

"I will make you one for food. But I must make it, first." He brought up supplies. "Tell me stories of other systems. I yearn for it. Please?" one begged.

I smiled. "Sure. I'm Java," I said, offering my hand.

"Roger," he replied, taking my hand in his wiry one.

I walked back to the null-seller with the miniature databush in my arms. She was truly impressed with my success. "Ye were successful, I see."

"You set me up," I accused. "You knew they'd tell me horror stories."

"Aye, it was a trick. But ye did meet Roger?

"Yeah. He's sweet!"

"Aye, an' ye are too, an' brave as well. Wave's yours." She opened the null's cage, picked it's wiggling body up, and plopped it into my cupped hands. 

It was the size of my forearm. When it touched me, instead of "biting" me by draining my energy suddenly, it touched one of it's ends to a thumb and did a very light drain on it. Then it crawled up my arm and into my bag, I guess to sleep.

"Oh, it likes ye. Have a good time in Dumass," she said, and, picking up her databush, walked away to bring it home. And I left the bazaar for another adventure.

Toodles.


End file.
